W
wpjb
Guest
In this bad economy, how can 10 radio stations in the New London metro survive? Are any of these stations up for sale? Are there any format flips coming in 2009?
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There were basically 3 radio companies competing for revenue 25 years ago. That's pretty much the case today. There are just more stations under each roof, with one less AM and many new FMs. Individual stations are now less manpower intensive thanks to voicetracking and syndication. A guy doing news on the talk station may also be a utility guy on the CHR next door.
More stations don't necessarily mean less listeners for the other local ones. A classic hits local arrival may take listeners from a classic hits out-of-towner. People tend to gravitate toward the local station, especially if the transmitter is just up the road. Hartford and Providence are 45 miles away from New London/Groton/Norwich.
This is also a pretty active entertainment market, with venues that draw all the way from northern New England. It's not all about casinos, but we'll see how well rounded the economy is as time goes by.
More stations don't necessarily mean less listeners for the other local ones. A classic hits local arrival may take listeners from a classic hits out-of-towner. People tend to gravitate toward the local station, especially if the transmitter is just up the road. Hartford and Providence are 45 miles away from New London/Groton/Norwich.
This is also a pretty active entertainment market, with venues that draw all the way from northern New England. It's not all about casinos, but we'll see how well rounded the economy is as time goes by.
The New London Market has evolved over the years. True there is no Rock or Hot/Modern AC, or Smooth Jazz they have the major formats covered.
FM:
97.7 Country - Hall Communications
98.7 Classic Hits - Hall Communications
100.9 Oldies - Hall Communications
102.3 Classic Hits - Citadel
104.7 News/Talk (their COL and tower is on Long Island) - Citadel
105.5 CHR - Citadel
106.5 Soft Rock - Red Wolf
107.7 Hip-Hop - Red Wolf
AM:
980 Spanish Tropical - Citadel
1310 Standards/Talk - Hall
And 1420 in Old Saybrook reaches part of the New London market which is a unique station piped in from 1150 in Middletown.
FM:
97.7 Country - Hall Communications
98.7 Classic Hits - Hall Communications
100.9 Oldies - Hall Communications
102.3 Classic Hits - Citadel
104.7 News/Talk (their COL and tower is on Long Island) - Citadel
105.5 CHR - Citadel
106.5 Soft Rock - Red Wolf
107.7 Hip-Hop - Red Wolf
AM:
980 Spanish Tropical - Citadel
1310 Standards/Talk - Hall
And 1420 in Old Saybrook reaches part of the New London market which is a unique station piped in from 1150 in Middletown.
R
rapsux104
Guest
MarcB said:
Somebody needs to put a rock station out here, reception for 104 and CCC is terrible and HD doesnt help, I think q105 is the only station that broadcasts in HD out here maybe they need an alternative or Active Rock HD2, although i hear rumors that wurh is considering expanding there coverage and changing there city of liscence from waterbury-hartford to New Haven so that might help, or maybe i just need to shut up, stop complaining and get xm.
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rapsux104
Guest
the only good stations in this marketMarcB said:
I don't know if Rock will work in New London. When Citadel first bought 102.3 they flipped it from Oldies to Rock. They were called "ROCK 102" stealing the name from Springfield's Classic Rock station. That format didn't last too long and they went Classic Rock "XL 102.3", AC "MIX 102", News-Talk "NewsTalk 102.3", and now they're doing Classic Hits as "102.3 The Wolf" when they swapped frequencies, calls, and formats with 104.7 FM.
13 years ago 98.7 was a bird-fed Rock station. Their provider went belly up. And for about 6 month I think they ran a rock format in-house automated before the flipped the station to Standards as a simulcast of the now defunct WNLC 1510.
13 years ago 98.7 was a bird-fed Rock station. Their provider went belly up. And for about 6 month I think they ran a rock format in-house automated before the flipped the station to Standards as a simulcast of the now defunct WNLC 1510.
kms575 said:
Yup, sounds about right.
For awhile, WKNL used Westwood One Oldies outside of AM Drive, but after BUckley complained (at the time, WDRC-FM was using WW1 overnights), they went to ABC Oldies Radio. Now, WKNL is live 5am to 10am and 2pm to 7pm butvoicetracked 10am to 2pm, 7pm to 12mid and 12mid to 6am weekdays and most all weekend..
Before WKNL was "KOOL 101", it was the legendary, earth shaking WTYD (The Tide), which ran Bonneville E-Z listening forever or until all the reel to reel tapes were too spliced to use any more. They then tried a soft rock, at work format for a while, still as TYD, which was "washed away", as you say, by the upstart WBMW around the turn of the century. They've been KOOL ever since.
C
Channel Surf
Guest
Just curious...What was the pattern of the old WNLC-AM 1510 like? I assume that it protected WMEX and the multiple other occupants of 1510-Boston.
WNLC-1510 was one of the most directional AM stations on the planet. As I recall, they used at least 8 towers near Cross Road in Waterford... maybe even 10 on night pattern. During the day, their 10,000 watts pointed away from the west, and WFIF-1500 Milford took over on I-95 by the time you reached Old Lyme. Even though only WTIC-AM had more power among Connecticut AMs, even their day pattern north wasn't that impressive. WNLC didn't pack much punch east past Mystic either. At night, the pattern basically covered Waterford, New London and Groton City at 1000 watts (I think)... with almost no signal north. Way before my time, they were nondirectional on 1490. Someone apparently thought it would be prestigious to have 10,000 directional watts, which gave them a lot of nulls in their own local market.
kms575 said:
Iit was 8 towers total right on Cross road and the station was 10KW Day and night.... I'm pretty sure on everything but the night power level.
Late in it's life, there was a fire in the doghouse at one of the towers, forcing WNLC-AM to operate Non Directionally with 100 Watts before simply turning in the license because it would've been too costly to fix. A staff member at hall during that time told me the 100W had a better signal in some areas then the directional 10KW!
http://www.necrat.com/wnlc.html
kms575 said:
The towers have been gone 7 or more years..
10k days/5k nights on 1510. The 8 tower array was designed in the late 50s by the CE at the time, Randall Barrett. Big kilowatt AMs were the rage then. I'm not sure how good the signal was when the copper was fresh, but by the time I got there, our engineers had a hard time getting a proof!
I was the PD/OM for WNLC/WTYD during the 50th anniversary in 1986 and in talking with old timers about the original signal on 1490 at 1kw - (a single stick sitting in the salt water of the harbor near the current downtown ferry terminal) - it got out better than the 10k monster ever did.
My friends at Hall told me that everything is gone from Foster Road including the studio/transmitter building and the bomb shelter under the big mound of earth that FEMA paid to refurbish (just in case the commies took out EB and the sub base).
CJ
I was the PD/OM for WNLC/WTYD during the 50th anniversary in 1986 and in talking with old timers about the original signal on 1490 at 1kw - (a single stick sitting in the salt water of the harbor near the current downtown ferry terminal) - it got out better than the 10k monster ever did.
My friends at Hall told me that everything is gone from Foster Road including the studio/transmitter building and the bomb shelter under the big mound of earth that FEMA paid to refurbish (just in case the commies took out EB and the sub base).
CJ
C
Channel Surf
Guest
Interesting...thanks for the replies...I do recall that when I would drive west of Boston, in the early 70s,
WMEX tended to fade rather rapidly and 1510 would in fact get taken over for a while by WNLC between Worcester and Springfield.
WMEX tended to fade rather rapidly and 1510 would in fact get taken over for a while by WNLC between Worcester and Springfield.
Channel Surf said:
You sure it was WNLC? They were SO directional you could see the towers but not hear them... you couldn't ehar them in Norwich, let alone WIllimantic/Windam or Worcester!
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